Submitted Photo As long as it takes to grow a deer population, it shrinks faster than it grows with cropland conversion and the loss of habitat. Photo from NDGF.

My guess is that most deer hunters don’t tire of the “Turdy Point Buck” tune on the radio until the backside of deer season. For a change, though, I’d sure enjoy listening to a refrain about hunting antlerless deer in North Dakota.

Then again, doe hunting doesn’t quite get the credit it deserves. In fact, when stories of deer seasons past bounce around like an empty pop can in the box of a pickup, odds are you won’t hear many recollections about “the time Todd got that doe down in the slough bottom.”

Seriously, next time the coffee conversation kicks up a deer hunting story and the rest of the crew begin adding their own into the mix, keep a mental count of how many include our antlerless deer. Can you add your own story of a doe hunt?

Deer hunting in North Dakota changes over time. Habitat takes years to create and help grow the deer population like it was 15 years ago with peaks of more than 3.5 million acres of CRP combined with a stretch of mild winters.

But as long as it takes to grow a population, it shrinks even faster with cropland conversion and the loss of habitat.

For this year the Game and Fish Department made available 53,400 licenses for the 2023 deer gun hunting season, a decrease of 10,800 following a brutal winter that arrived in November and hung around until April.

The statewide hunter success rate in 2022 was 53%, which was 4% lower than 2021 and below the goal of 70%. Low hunter success was likely due in large part to high winds and blizzard conditions during the first two weekends of the season.

When wildlife managers dig through the statistics you can appreciate how after the first days and weekend of deer hunting the amount of time spent in the field drops off significantly.

Statistically in terms of population surveying index, department biologists conducted aerial surveys on all hunting units in the state during the winter of 2023. The Wing-Tuttle monitoring block (units 2J1 and 2J2) was flown in January and again in April and deer numbers had declined by 53% during that time period. 53% in just a few months.

With lower deer numbers, biologists made what might be perceived as modest reductions in license numbers. State Century Code requires that all landowners with more than 150 acres are entitled to receive a deer license, and in 2023, it was anticipated about 12,300 landowners would request a deer gun license. Knowing that gratis hunters tend to be less successful and to ensure that licenses were available to non-gratis hunters, an overall reduction of 17% was made.

Licenses made available in some units may be perceived by some to be higher than appropriate. Deer hunting unit 2E might serve as an example where 300 (21%) fewer licenses were made available. Of the 1,100 deer gun licenses made available in 2023, it was anticipated 640 would go to gratis hunters. It’s just one example of how each unit is unique and those who apply for their preferred unit each year adjust to the license allocation.

From a deer management standpoint in North Dakota, antlerless deer are the key. Game and Fish Department big Bill Jensen relates, “The way you control the deer population is not by shooting bucks, but by shooting does. The way you grow a population is reducing pressure on does as the buck population will take care of itself.”

Jensen said each adult doe in a good year with a tolerable winter and sufficient habitat will, on average, give birth to two fawns in the spring. So, for example, if that adult doe is not bagged this fall, by next November there will be three deer running around instead of just one. “Deer are a pretty forgiving species,” Jensen said, “so if you just allow them to do their thing and reproduce, they are pretty easy to manage.

This season’s hunt may be a success for you just drawing a tag. Others may only consider it a success if they fill their buck tag with the big one.

In between lie thousands of other hunters with their own expectations. It’s what makes hunting so unique and special.